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‘Spiritual but not religious’ becoming common self-identification

A Gallup Poll released in May showed that now 16 percent of Americans don’t have a religious identity, which is up from about 2 percent in 1968.

By Joshunda SandersCox Newspapers

Published: Tuesday, June 1, 2010 at 4:26 p.m.

Last Modified: Tuesday, June 1, 2010 at 4:26 p.m.

AUSTIN, Texas — Laura Rios grew up Catholic, dancing in honor of the Virgin of Guadalupe, patroness of the Americas and a symbol of Mexican identity.

Now, at 32, dancing is still her main expression of the sacred in her life, though now she does it to honor her ancestors.

Rios’ Aztec dancing is part of her spiritual life, like the ritual tattoos she has on her arms and the poems she reads by the Sufi mystic Rumi. She’s one of an estimated 30 percent of Americans who refer to themselves as “spiritual, not religious” according to a 2009 Newsweek poll — up from 24 percent in 2005.

A Gallup Poll released in May showed that now 16 percent of Americans don’t have a religious identity, which is up from about 2 percent in 1968.

As most mainline Protestant churches have continued to report membership declines because of what the Rev. Eileen W. Lindner, editor of the annual Yearbook of American and Canadian Churches, has called “an increasing secularization of American postmodern society,” there has been increasing attention on what it means to have a spiritual life outside of a church, mosque or synagogue.

Recently released research focusing on millennials, people between the ages of 19 and 30, shows that they are increasingly likely to move away from the faiths they grew up in and blend multiple faiths and spiritual practices as they go through college.

Jason Steans, 37, says he grew up Protestant but as an adult found himself embracing a more general sense of spirituality based on the belief that “spirituality involves defining ourselves through the acts performed throughout our lifetime. We aren’t just physical bodies — we are the total sum of the effect that we have on the world.”

For Steans, that effect can happen without the influence of church.

“Churches have been notoriously irrelevant for the last 30 years,” said Will Davis Jr., 48, who leads the nondenominational church Austin Christian Fellowship, which has about 1,900 members. “As a leader of the church, I’ve got to own that, though it’s starting to change.”

Davis said church infighting and many churches’ focus on new buildings instead of consistent community outreach through service have moved Americans away from church. The Rev. Bobbi Kaye Jones, superintendent for the Austin District of the United Methodist Church, said there’s a long list of reasons people have been leaving mainline churches.

“People are disillusioned with organized religion, for one,” Jones said. “Our society is such that people take the question, ‘What does this do for me?’ to everything, but the perspective for previous generations was, ‘What can I bring to this organization?’”

She said that young people, in particular, want “to be active, they want to be contributing, and they want to be connected. Their churches can do all of that, if they will.”

At Austin Christian Fellowship, for instance, Davis said membership has been helped by the staff’s efforts there to engage in more social justice initiatives such as Mobile Loaves and Fishes and other volunteer work.

That type of work is particularly important in a place such as Austin, he said, a city where people love the outdoors and can find their spirituality on the hike-and-bike trail.

On her patio, Valerie Hutzler, 53, of Pflugerville, Texas, found a different connection to God from the one she found when she was raised in Catholicism, she said.

“I didn’t think of or really believe in God for decades until one of my sons joined the Marine Corps,” she said. Looking up at the stars from her patio, she said, she asked God to look out for her son. The sense of comfort she got from that simple request, surrounded by the beauty of nature, eventually sold her on the idea of developing a unique spirituality, she said.

“Awakening that relationship with God on my end opened me up to a lot of personal gifts,” Hutzler said. “No amount of education can buy you that.”

University of Nebraska-Lincoln sociologist Philip Schwadel released a study in April — based on survey data from 41,000 Americans — that found that despite a moderate decline in the 1990s, Americans’ churchgoing routines have been fairly constant over the decades — people attend about 23 to 28 services a year.

But those who attend Christian services are more likely now to attend services at more than one place. The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life found in 2009 that 35 percent of Americans who attend church regularly usually go to different churches, maybe a Catholic Mass and a Buddhist sangha, for example.

Rios is one of many Americans who blend belief systems such as Christianity or Islam with other sources of inspiration, such as Buddhist meditation, yoga or belief in reincarnation. The former Catholic started working in sales for MCI while attending Austin Community College. Through friends and co-workers, she said, she learned about Buddhism and Islam and found herself particularly transformed by reading the Quran.

What really catapulted her evolving spiritual connection was reading “The Prophet,” a collection of philosophical essays by Lebanese American author Kahlil Gibran.

For more than three years in her 20s, she was drawn to exploring the life of a Muslim, and she prayed five times a day and attended the Nueces Mosque. But she said Islam didn’t allow her to express herself through dance the way she wanted, and the restrictions of the religion led her back to her life of seeking.

Although her parents and grandparents attended church as a way of life, she said, she found it hard to make the same choice.

She said she learned that she felt most alive and closest to God when she was moving.

“Dancing was the one thing that kept me spiritually intact,” she said. “I always used movement to pray, through breakdancing and the dance that I did as a kid. Dance was my prayer. It was what my soul needed to feel connected to God. It was my spiritual warrior training.”

It’s been a truism of American life that young people generally leave home, stop going to church once they go to college and then, as they get older, return to the church of their youth. Stephen Prothero, a professor of religion at Boston University and author of the new book “God is Not One: The Eight Rival Religions That Run the World — and Why Their Differences Matter,” says that what has changed is the mobility of the young.

“Spirituality is almost certainly going up among young people,” Prothero said. “Things are changing because we can travel more than we used to, and now there’s information available (about different religions) on the Internet.

“It’s also very American to pick and choose,“ he added. “Who are these religions to tell us that we have to take the whole thing? We want to have some self-determination when it comes to our religion.“

A LifeWay Research study of 1,200 people between the ages of 19 and 30 released in May showed that even young Christians were beginning to move away from traditional churchgoing religion and into more spiritual territory.

The group, which is funded by the Southern Baptist Convention and produces research on church populations, found that while two-thirds of the people surveyed called themselves Christian, “religious involvement (in that age group) is somewhat uncommon; half pray by themselves once a week or more, but one-quarter or fewer read sacred texts, attend worship services, pray corporately, or study sacred texts in a small group setting this frequently.“

That trend has caught the attention of churches. At the Hill Country Bible Church Northwest, which has about 6,000 members, young-adult pastor John Short, 42, holds weekly services for the few hundred young people at a clubhouse at a North Austin apartment complex. They won’t come to church, so he goes to them, he said.

“People consider religion or denominations like guardrails on a highway: that there’s no true answer, but the ideas lead you in the right direction,“ he said.

Rios finds her spiritual home with her dance group. While she still observes Ramadan, the ritual fasting required of all Muslims annually, she performs a more personal ritual involving clear water on her bedside and writing down her prayers on a piece of paper she places beneath it.

“What spirituality teachers you is that you know how to deal with whatever comes,“ Rios said. “In spirituality, you are a servant to your spirit.“

<p>AUSTIN, Texas — Laura Rios grew up Catholic, dancing in honor of the Virgin of Guadalupe, patroness of the Americas and a symbol of Mexican identity.</p><p>Now, at 32, dancing is still her main expression of the sacred in her life, though now she does it to honor her ancestors.</p><p>Rios' Aztec dancing is part of her spiritual life, like the ritual tattoos she has on her arms and the poems she reads by the Sufi mystic Rumi. She's one of an estimated 30 percent of Americans who refer to themselves as “spiritual, not religious” according to a 2009 Newsweek poll — up from 24 percent in 2005.</p><p>A Gallup Poll released in May showed that now 16 percent of Americans don't have a religious identity, which is up from about 2 percent in 1968.</p><p>As most mainline Protestant churches have continued to report membership declines because of what the Rev. Eileen W. Lindner, editor of the annual Yearbook of American and Canadian Churches, has called “an increasing secularization of American postmodern society,” there has been increasing attention on what it means to have a spiritual life outside of a church, mosque or synagogue.</p><p>Recently released research focusing on millennials, people between the ages of 19 and 30, shows that they are increasingly likely to move away from the faiths they grew up in and blend multiple faiths and spiritual practices as they go through college.</p><p>Jason Steans, 37, says he grew up Protestant but as an adult found himself embracing a more general sense of spirituality based on the belief that “spirituality involves defining ourselves through the acts performed throughout our lifetime. We aren't just physical bodies — we are the total sum of the effect that we have on the world.”</p><p>For Steans, that effect can happen without the influence of church.</p><p>“Churches have been notoriously irrelevant for the last 30 years,” said Will Davis Jr., 48, who leads the nondenominational church Austin Christian Fellowship, which has about 1,900 members. “As a leader of the church, I've got to own that, though it's starting to change.”</p><p>Davis said church infighting and many churches' focus on new buildings instead of consistent community outreach through service have moved Americans away from church. The Rev. Bobbi Kaye Jones, superintendent for the Austin District of the United Methodist Church, said there's a long list of reasons people have been leaving mainline churches.</p><p>“People are disillusioned with organized religion, for one,” Jones said. “Our society is such that people take the question, 'What does this do for me?' to everything, but the perspective for previous generations was, 'What can I bring to this organization?'”</p><p>She said that young people, in particular, want “to be active, they want to be contributing, and they want to be connected. Their churches can do all of that, if they will.”</p><p>At Austin Christian Fellowship, for instance, Davis said membership has been helped by the staff's efforts there to engage in more social justice initiatives such as Mobile Loaves and Fishes and other volunteer work.</p><p>That type of work is particularly important in a place such as Austin, he said, a city where people love the outdoors and can find their spirituality on the hike-and-bike trail.</p><p>On her patio, Valerie Hutzler, 53, of Pflugerville, Texas, found a different connection to God from the one she found when she was raised in Catholicism, she said.</p><p>“I didn't think of or really believe in God for decades until one of my sons joined the Marine Corps,” she said. Looking up at the stars from her patio, she said, she asked God to look out for her son. The sense of comfort she got from that simple request, surrounded by the beauty of nature, eventually sold her on the idea of developing a unique spirituality, she said.</p><p>“Awakening that relationship with God on my end opened me up to a lot of personal gifts,” Hutzler said. “No amount of education can buy you that.”</p><p>University of Nebraska-Lincoln sociologist Philip Schwadel released a study in April — based on survey data from 41,000 Americans — that found that despite a moderate decline in the 1990s, Americans' churchgoing routines have been fairly constant over the decades — people attend about 23 to 28 services a year.</p><p>But those who attend Christian services are more likely now to attend services at more than one place. The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life found in 2009 that 35 percent of Americans who attend church regularly usually go to different churches, maybe a Catholic Mass and a Buddhist sangha, for example.</p><p>Rios is one of many Americans who blend belief systems such as Christianity or Islam with other sources of inspiration, such as Buddhist meditation, yoga or belief in reincarnation. The former Catholic started working in sales for MCI while attending Austin Community College. Through friends and co-workers, she said, she learned about Buddhism and Islam and found herself particularly transformed by reading the Quran.</p><p>What really catapulted her evolving spiritual connection was reading “The Prophet,” a collection of philosophical essays by Lebanese American author Kahlil Gibran.</p><p>For more than three years in her 20s, she was drawn to exploring the life of a Muslim, and she prayed five times a day and attended the Nueces Mosque. But she said Islam didn't allow her to express herself through dance the way she wanted, and the restrictions of the religion led her back to her life of seeking.</p><p>Although her parents and grandparents attended church as a way of life, she said, she found it hard to make the same choice.</p><p>She said she learned that she felt most alive and closest to God when she was moving.</p><p>“Dancing was the one thing that kept me spiritually intact,” she said. “I always used movement to pray, through breakdancing and the dance that I did as a kid. Dance was my prayer. It was what my soul needed to feel connected to God. It was my spiritual warrior training.”</p><p>It's been a truism of American life that young people generally leave home, stop going to church once they go to college and then, as they get older, return to the church of their youth. Stephen Prothero, a professor of religion at Boston University and author of the new book “God is Not One: The Eight Rival Religions That Run the World — and Why Their Differences Matter,” says that what has changed is the mobility of the young.</p><p>“Spirituality is almost certainly going up among young people,” Prothero said. “Things are changing because we can travel more than we used to, and now there's information available (about different religions) on the Internet.</p><p>“It's also very American to pick and choose,“ he added. “Who are these religions to tell us that we have to take the whole thing? We want to have some self-determination when it comes to our religion.“</p><p>A LifeWay Research study of 1,200 people between the ages of 19 and 30 released in May showed that even young Christians were beginning to move away from traditional churchgoing religion and into more spiritual territory.</p><p>The group, which is funded by the Southern Baptist Convention and produces research on church populations, found that while two-thirds of the people surveyed called themselves Christian, “religious involvement (in that age group) is somewhat uncommon; half pray by themselves once a week or more, but one-quarter or fewer read sacred texts, attend worship services, pray corporately, or study sacred texts in a small group setting this frequently.“</p><p>That trend has caught the attention of churches. At the Hill Country Bible Church Northwest, which has about 6,000 members, young-adult pastor John Short, 42, holds weekly services for the few hundred young people at a clubhouse at a North Austin apartment complex. They won't come to church, so he goes to them, he said.</p><p>“People consider religion or denominations like guardrails on a highway: that there's no true answer, but the ideas lead you in the right direction,“ he said.</p><p>Rios finds her spiritual home with her dance group. While she still observes Ramadan, the ritual fasting required of all Muslims annually, she performs a more personal ritual involving clear water on her bedside and writing down her prayers on a piece of paper she places beneath it.</p><p>“What spirituality teachers you is that you know how to deal with whatever comes,“ Rios said. “In spirituality, you are a servant to your spirit.“</p>